Burying The Truth Behind Censorship At Conservative Blogs

In the last four days, I’ve had four comments at Charlie Sykes‘ blog “moderated” and deleted.  I suppose you might think those comments were filled with hate speech and vulgarity.  Guess again.  I rarely use that sort of language anywhere; I certainly know enough to not use it on a site where “censorship” is equal to freedom.

So what was in these comments?  I do believe the common thread was facts about Ronald Reagan.  I kid you not.  Just now, I left a comment about the Tax Reform Act of 1986, telling one of Charlie’s commenters that Reagan’s desire was to eliminate every tax loophole that the wealthy exploited, and to make America’s tax system easier for every one to deal with.  For my trouble, I got this message:

“Your comment has been sent for Approval” (paraphrased…I think)

On Charlie’s site, comments sent for moderation disappear.  This is the fourth time in the last few days, and every time it happens, it has to do with Ronald Reagan.  I told one of Charlie’s commenters to stop using Reagan as a poster child for Conservatives, and I did so because today’s Conservatives are nothing like Reagan.  Furthermore, they know almost nothing about what he thought, what his policies meant, or what he was trying to accomplish.  The fact is, they are using Reagan as a symbol of their movement, and it makes me sick. They are giving the Left ammunition to tear into a dead President’s legacy because of their idiotic desire to hitch their wagon to his star.  Today’s Conservatives are an insult to the memory of Ronald Reagan.

Charlie’s followers believe that people like Sarah Palin are true Reagan Conservatives.  Yet Reagan himself dreamed of a day when the world would be rid of all nuclear weapons.  Palin just vomited all over the mainstream media when President Obama suggested such a time.

in 1981, Israel bombed the Iraqi nuclear reactor at Osirak. Reagan was furious and the U.S. supported the UN Security Council resolution condemning Israel.  Such a response by President Obama the other day was condemned by “True Reagan Conservatives” like Palin as being anti-Semitic.  What a bunch of absolute hypocrites.

And now we find out that when the Right is called out on its lies about how they are true Reagan-Conservatives, they censor you.  Because…you know…we can’t have people knowing the truth now, can we?  That wouldn’t fit their tidy little narrative, about how they are the only ones who can keep us safe; the only ones who can balance a budget (Reagan never did), about how low taxes for the wealthy will balance the budget (Reagan set them at 50%, today’s “Conservatives” want them at 30% or less), and how Conservatives are the only true protectors of our Freedom, and anyone who says otherwise will be duly censored.

Nice, Charlie.  You must be so proud of your blog and your “Movement”.  I’ll bet “The Party” makes you Commissar in no time, comrade.

UPDATE:

As a test, I submitted this comment on Charlie Sykes’ blog:

“President Obama is Satan, and he wants to eat your children. No kidding, he feasts on the blood of nuns, but before he does, he forces them to have sex with crocodiles and the Ebola Virus, which is his secret plan for population control. But don’t let his soft heart fool you! He really wants to harvest your limbs and organs, and his health care bill proves it! He has a plan to raise Stalin from the dead, and feed your first born to him!…..Am I in?  Did I get crazy enough to be in?“

It was allowed without moderation.  I rest my case.

Newt Gingrich; That Exemplary, Shining Example of Conservative Christian Values

Republicans and Conservatives have a new-old hero:  Newt Gingrich.  Amazingly, Gingrich is being seriously discussed as one of their candidates for a 2012 Presidential election run.  Conservatives everywhere hold Gingrich up as a shining example of Conservative principles and family values.  So, what do those principles and values look like?

Taken from Wikipedia:

Gingrich has been married three times. He married Jackie Battley, his former high school geometry teacher, when he was 19 years old. She was seven years his senior at 26 years old.^[56][57] They had two daughters. The couple decided to divorce after Gingrich told his wife of his extra-marital affair while she was recovering from cancer surgery.^[58] In 1981, six months after his divorce was final, Gingrich wed Marianne Ginther.^[59] He remained married to Ginther until 2000, when they divorced. Shortly thereafter, Gingrich then married Callista Bisek, with whom he was conducting an extra-marital affair during the Congressional investigation of Bill Clinton‘s perjury relating to his affair with 23-year-old intern, Monica Lewinsky

On the surface, I see nothing wrong.  Yup, Gingrich is a shining example of exemplary Christian behavior, telling everybody how to live their lives while he acts like a heathen all of his.  He should fit right in.

With people like Gingrich, America doesn’t ever have to worry about Socialism.  We’ll be too focused on making sure we toe the Christian Conservative Hypocrisy Line.

Newt, you had an affair while your first wife was undergoing treatment for cancer?  Who does that?

Oh yeah, John Edwards does that.

Need I say more?  Conservatives and Republicans; if this is the best you got, maybe it’s time to fold your tent.

Charlie Sykes Calls Americans Who Earn Less Than $50k “Mooches”

I was listening to the Charlie Sykes Show this morning on my way back from Appleton.  This would have been between, oh, 9:45 AM and 10:30 AM or so.  Charlie was griping about the 47% of Americans who paid no taxes last year, and if you know Charlie, you can, of course, understand that the more worked up he got about the issue, the more whiny he sounded.

During one segment of his show, he began taking calls, and the general theme was “Those damned losers aren’t paying any taxes!”  Charlie recited something about a family of four that makes less than $50k not paying taxes, and then jumps into calls, at moments calling people like that mooches, feeders at the Public Trough, and parasites. He then began complaining that America punishes the risk takers, while coddling the low-income earners.

According to Charlie Sykes and his callers, the only people in America who are hard workers are those earning enough to pay taxes.

And if you happen to whine for a living on national air waves, that makes you an expert about hard work, right  Charlie?

Atta Boy Charlie!

Deficits, Unemployment, and Bear Markets; The Fruit of Tax Cuts and Deregulation

Republicans like to tell us that deregulation is good for business; that it causes more competition and lower prices for consumers.

But what does recent history tell us?

For the power industry, it tells us about Enron, and how they cheated, lied, stole, and strong-armed their way into a position where the world’s sixth largest economy was at their mercy for its electrical needs.  Enron created an artificial power shortage, and rolling blackouts swept California at a time when that state had far more than enough power generation capacity to meet its needs.   Enron used those blackouts to charge as much as twenty-times the actual going rate for electricity.   The story of Enron will probably never be forgotten; it’s one of the worst examples that deregulation proponents to have to deal with.

Let’s see, for the finance industry, where do I begin?  Where does it end?  Credit default swaps, an unregulated security basically brought down the entire financial sector in 2008.  Nearly every major bank in America required a bailout.  Also, nearly every major bank in America cooked its books to some extent to make their stock more attractive than their actual profits could back up.  It turned out that commercial and investment banks were built on a house of cards, and when the check was due, they couldn’t pay their tab. America had to bailout huge banks for fear that if we didn’t, the world’s economy would collapse. The rescinding of Glass-Steagall created a good-ol-boys network of banks too big for their britches, while executives at these firms took extremely shortsighted views of what it meant to build a profitable, stable company.

So..tell us again how deregulation is good for business?  Tell us again how deregulation creates jobs and competition; how it lowers costs to consumers?

The only history of deregulation I can think of turned out to be a nightmare for Americans both times, thanks to Enron and banks-too-big-to-fail.  One in five American males is unemployed.  Not just UNDER-employed.  UN-employed. That is as a result of the Wall Street meltdown.

Conservatives gripe about the progressive tax rate and the era of regulation that stemmed from the Great Depression.

Well, answer me this:  The period between 1945 and 1986 is generally known for economic stability, a growing, hard-working, ethical and moral middle class, and an achievable American Dream.  Since tax rates have been cut drastically and deregulation has taken hold, what three things  is America known for?

I’ll give you a hint.  The first answer starts with d-e-f-i-c-i-…and the second answer starts with u-n-e-m-p-l-o-y-m-e-n… and the third answer begins with b-e-a-r-m-a-r-k-e…

Think you can come up with the answers?  Conservatives want more of that.  I’m not sure what Liberals want.  I don’t think they know either.

I want a policy that uses the best of all ideas, rather than a policy that sticks to the failed, stale ideologies of the Nineteenth Century, like the two parties use.

Was The Financial Meltdown Manufactured By Banks-Too-Big-To-Fail?

The Enron Nine:  J.P. Morgan Chase, Citigroup, Credit Suisse First Boston, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, Bank of America, Merrill Lynch, Barclay’s, Deutsche Bank and Lehman Brothers.

The Bailout Nine:  Fannie Mae, AIG, Freddie Mac, Bank of America, Citigroup, J.P. Morgan, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley.

Merril Lynch was bought by Bank of America but is also famous for using one-third of the bailout money it received to give bonuses to its top executives.  In 2008, Credit Suisse was caught overvaluing its assets by $2.85 Billion.  Lehman Brothers, of course, was allowed to die.  It filed for the world’s largest bankruptcy discharge ever in 2008.  The previous record was held by none other than Enron.  Canadian Imperial is of course, Canadian, but since 2003 has been involved in one controversy after another.  From as late as 2001 to at least 2007, Deutsche Bank engaged in a covert espionage scandal on its critics.  Barclay’s needed a huge bailout from its own British Government.

I thought it was interesting that five American banking firms were tied to Enron scandals and were also amongst the largest firms to receive bailouts or bankruptcy discharge due to the mortgage crisis.  Of course everyone knows that Wells Fargo, J.P. Morgan, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs,  Citigroup and Morgan Stanley received one hundred cents on the dollar from the Federal Government for their bad bets on AIG Credit Default Swaps.  Those firms continue to this day to chase down the individual owners of those mortgages, meaning they are being paid twice for the same credit transaction.  Ever wonder how they paid back the Fed so quickly?  Now you know.

What does it say for America and its banking system when five of the companies that helped Enron cook its books were also five of the most heavily bailed out firms in America? Coincidence?  Or does it rather tell us that there is an overwhelming culture of corruption at America’s biggest banks?  Can we do anything about this?  Does anyone want to?

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac need to go.  I think it has already been proven beyond doubt that they are as corrupt as lenders can be.  But what about these other guys?  They all continue to receive respect in the business sector, even after some of the largest scandals in the financial history of the world.  They are currently fighting financial regulatory reform tooth and nail, and it seems as though they are winning.  There is already talk that “Banks-too-big-to-fail” will be allowed to remain as such, meaning the next financial meltdown is only as far away as one of these banks next brain farts.

How do we reign in these mammoths?  Do we need to get more serious about prosecuting some of these people?  An even bigger question lies unanswered:  Was the housing bubble artificially created?  With the advent of Credit default swaps, did these huge banks see a way to take on very risky debt at high interest rates and get paid anyway?  Did they use that opportunity to create a crisis where they knew the government would have to bail them out and honor AIG’s CDS commitments?

No one has answered these questions.  No one in our government has even asked them.  Why not?  I want to know.  Was the financial meltdown MANUFACTURED by these Banks-too-big-to-fail?  History is not on their side.  The only evidence we have from their collective pasts is that, hell yes, we ought to be massively investigating if they manufactured this crisis for a huge payday.

How Do We Create Jobs RIGHT NOW?

Question for you guys:

How are we going to create more jobs?  The Stimulus didn’t work; it’s clear.  Bush’  tax cuts and stimulus checks didn’t, either.  So what’s the answer?  We need to do something now, and I mean right now.  Throw ideology out the window; if Americans continue to be unemployed at this present rate, our country will devolve, and revolution will ensue.

What do we do?

Give Us Your Money So We Can Blow it on Naked Women and Five-Star Hotels; An Essay on the Disgusting Practice of Political Party Donor Fraud

Have I mentioned recently how much I hate political parties?  The Republicans preach family values and then party it up at a bondage club, for nearly two thousand dollars.  At any strip club, that’s a lot of partying!

Democrats jump on the pogo stick immediately and call them hypocrites, all the while they waste their donor’s money on five-star hotels and restaurants, because, as you know, “The Party’s” business cannot be done in a shabby four-star hotel conference room.  Glad to see that their standards are so assiduously adhered to.  (yes, I know!  I used a big word!)

It’s all bullshit.  It’s just another example of the political elites in America believing they really are worth more than the rest of us, just like the fantastically wealthy that they both take pokes at from time to time.

Here’s a question:  How can we as Americans believe anything these two parties say when it comes to what we have to do with our economy and with our budget?  It’s not like there are too many examples to count of financial restraint in Party business.  On the contrary, there’s pretty much only waste and fraud to point to.

Fraud?  That’s a pretty strong accusation there, Mr The Pooper Pants.

Is it?  What else would you call blowing cash on the high, high, high life when your Party’s ideology states that you are fiscal conservatives and you receive donations because people agree with your views?  Is there another name for claiming to be the friend of the Middle Class, the poor, and Minorities all the while dining to the tune of $125 per person?  I don’t know of too many poor people or even Middle Class people who can afford to do that even once in their lifetimes, and still those poor and Middle Classers give their five, ten or twenty dollar donations to the Party of the Downtrodden.

One thing is certain.  Neither party can be trusted with other people’s money, and if you can’t be trusted in the little things, how on earth are we supposed to trust you with the big things?      Ω